Regrets
by dolphinsramazing
Summary: Tony/Ziva tag to 9x24 Til Death Do Us Part. Likely to be continued.
1. Chapter 1

"No! I am not going without you!" she bellows, and it erupts from her lips far angrier than she desired. In fact, she wishes she had said it sweeter and softer and slower, because then maybe, possibly, it could have carried the indelible weight she had subconsciously intended for it to hold. But instead, the most brutally honest thing she's allowed herself to say to him in six years is probably lost in the heat of the moment, in the impending bomb looming over their heads. She takes a moment, all she can allow herself as the seconds tick by, to steal a glance and his eyes are doing that squinty thing when he is…pensive and ponderous.

This is not the time, though, to be analyzing her partner's facial expressions. Even though it has not quite hit her yet, the imminent destruction of the place that has been more of her home than her actual dwelling is a life and death situation. She has certainly faced her fair share of those, as has he, but this time, it washes over her in a wave of clarity: she could easily, with the snip of a wire or the ring of a phone, die here. And she cannot simply duck and dodge the bullet, or rely on her team to take out the perpetrator; she is trapped inside a building that is destined to explode, with little chance of getting out before it happens. Each breath she takes becomes precious. Suddenly, she is trying to suck in so much oxygen that she is hyperventilating, and the ugly orange walls (she has never liked orange) are closing in on her. Doubling over, she stops in her tracks for a moment, cognizant that she hasn't the moment to spare, but needs to gather herself in order to carry on. Because still, even after all these years, she does not like to break down in front of other people. It is a private thing, an embarrassment, her brain tells her, even if her heart just wants to fall in Tony's arms and let him carry her home.

As her gaze is firmly fixed on the carpet that blurs in and out, she feels a hand interlocking with hers, large and soft and warm. "Ziva," he whispers, letting her name fall off his tongue like a waterfall. "Stay with me. " He places a tentative hand on her arm, knowing instinctively that some days she is still wary of contact. "Come on, "he soothes, "we can make it out of here." For the first time in her life, she finds herself blindly following someone else's lead as he walks her to the elevator, their odd sanctuary.

"The elevator, Tony? Really?" she regains some of her old snarkiness, artfully mixed with a fear for her life and his.

"It'll be faster," he claims, and there's no retort on her tongue, and it feels safer, even now, when they are so undeniably unsafe, to adhere to routine, to custom. They step into the elevator.

He hurriedly presses the button for the ground floor, and again the urgency of the situation impacts her; easily, with a flash of twisting inferno, they might die here, in this cold metal box. She does not want to live with regrets, she vividly recalls telling him on the precipice of accepting Ray's proposal, willfully ignoring the subtle pain and betrayal written all over his face, etched in the lines of his forehead and the upturned corners of his mouth. But she really, truly, does not want to _die_ with regrets, because reparations can never be made. She cannot make an addendum to her life; by the way, I loved you with all my heart, but I never told you because I was blinded by fear. He will never know the inexplicable value he holds in her scheme of things, how very much he means to her, how his smile, the true one that travels all the way to his twinkling eyes, is one of the few and far in between things that makes reciprocate the gesture. That hoping against all rational reasoning and truth of reality that she could have one more moment with him, to say how sorry she was, kept her alive those long days and ceaseless nights in the African desert. Their love story cannot come to a close like this, replete with unspoken promises and a rosy future, but still, when it comes down to it, unfulfilled and unrequited.

Now if only she had the courage to rewrite their ending.

Tony's praying. Delving deep into the recesses of his consciousness for scattered words and meaningful phrases, he strings together what could only be called a plea laced with a healthy measure of desperation. Despite skillfully maintaining a stoic demeanor, he's scared out of his damn mind. This isn't a death he can exert some semblance of control over or evade in a miraculous ray of good luck. If that bomb goes off before they can get the hell out of this cursed building, it's game over for both of them: no morewhat ifs or what could have beens. Their lives will be snuffed out as simply as blowing out a candle; surely, they'll be missed, but after time passes and the hurt fades, they'll forget the beautiful girl who graced their lives with such strength and determination and the man who chased her.

And so he opts to recruit any sort of divine intervention he can possibly garner. After all, it had been his saving grace once before: his bargain with God when his partner had first been taken from his grasp, by jealousy and pettiness and a vengeful father. The deity had certainly pulled through- he had brought her back to him, and invisible next to the Israeli, but there nonetheless, returned his sanity. It's playing with fire to ask for her life to be spared a second time, but he's at the no holds barred point, where he'll, without hesitation, lay anything on the line, his own life included, to salvage her.

Not that he has a death wish, of course, but she just deserves _this_, all that they have here in Washington, here in America, so much more than he. Born with the silver spoon in his mouth, doors have always been opened for him. She's fought, against all odds, tooth and nail, for her survival, for the life she's made for herself here. Where he knows, even though she'd never tell him, she aches for the stereotypical, oddly idyllic American dream that had been at an interminable distance for so long. And now, blissful happiness, perhaps together, is at their fingertips, but they'll likely fall short of it again.

A jarring movement catches them both off guard, but in an instant, they indubitably know. This is the moment of truth, the moment of wondering whether fate would intercede on their behalf once again. They exchange a quick glance, a broken hearted goodbye, weighed down with so many emotions surging through them at rapid fire speed. As the elevator caves in on them, Ziva leaps on top of Tony, a primal response to shield him from the impact of the blast as they both collide with the floor. He reaches out instinctively, wrapping his arm around her torso to hold her close to him in their final moments. Their free hands interlock, fitting together perfectly and naturally as his head ricochets off the ground, emitting a loud bang, and a piece of debris catapults through the air, landing on her back.

"Marry me," he whispers tenderly, a look of incredulity spreading across her face as the lights go out.


	2. Chapter 2

**It's not the greatest; I'm fairly certain I screwed up a lot of the medical stuff. But there will be more Tony/Ziva goodness next chapter. This was more of a logistical chapter. **

She stirs slowly. Beams of light dance at the edge of her vision as she struggles to regain her bearings. She opens her eyes gingerly, the world spinning as the brilliant colors all meld together in an indistinguishable medley. A dull headache pounds between her temples as comprehension continues to evade her. Where is she? The last thing she can recall is…the bomb. Dearing's bomb that he planted in Vance's car for the sole intention of blind, furious vengeance. She has been there, and while she cannot empathize, she can feel a measure of understanding. Tony helped her clear the building…Tony! Eyes darting around wildly, she settles on her partner in the most obvious and most inconvenient place: she is on top of him.

And then it all comes back to her in a cascade of memories; she told him that she would not leave without him, she broke down in the hallway and he comforted her, they took the elevator, the bomb went off, and he proposed to her. He asked her to marry him, and she wills herself to believe that he did not truly mean it, that it just fell off his tongue in haste when reality set in. When it comes down to it, she does not want to get her hopes up. Because she would say yes in a heartbeat, irrational as that may sound. But she has bigger things to worry about than a warped sort of deathbed confession at the moment. Perhaps like the fact that her partner has still not awoken. Frantically, she presses her ear to his chest, and relief washes over her as she hears the sound of his slow, steady pulse.

But as swiftly as the relief overtook her, so deftly does panic take its place. For their little corner of the elevator floor is stained with crimson blood. While rationally she knows that head wounds bleed superficially and the damage probably isn't really all that devastating, the emotional side of her that she has kept under wraps for so long takes center stage. She cannot control the tears that flow freely from her eyes. _It's your fault_, she thinks. Her tackling him to the floor may have caused more harm than good. He has had his fair share of concussions, and she thinks that each time the effects are multiplied. All in all, this is not good.

"Tony," she chokes through her veil of tears. She pleads, "Please wake up." And if he had just been waiting for her to implore, he opens his eyes.

"Hmmm?" His grunt is hoarse as he gasps for air. She answers him with merely a shy smile. They have never needed words to have a conversation. Instinctively, he stretches his battered body, and jumps when he feels the blood matted in his hair.

It frightens her to see him look so scared, so little boy lost, as they say. "What happened to us, Ziva?" he asks, his voice taking on a grave note.

"You don't remember?" she blurts out the first thing that comes to mind. _He does not remember any of it_, she laments. _Another missed opportunity._ And she cannot stifle the look of disappointment that plays over her features.

He admits ashamedly, "It's all kind of a blur, to be honest." A pained look dances across his features as he massages his temples, trying to relieve the pressure.

She chooses her words carefully. "You hit your head, I believe. But I am sure it is fine."

Her attempt is weak at best; concern permeates her words, and he is fully aware of it.

"The bomb," he states. "We're gonna get that SOB Dearing, Ziva." And the hint of his old resilience, though tempered by pain and desperation, brings a small smile to her face. "Was anyone else in the building? Abby? Gibbs? McGee?"

She instantly chastises herself for her selfishness; her fellow teammates have not even crossed her mind. She had simply assumed her family was safe, but is well acquainted with rule number eight: never take anything for granted. And the profundity of that statement has never seemed greater than right now, when they are all in jeopardy. All too often, she forgets how perilous their occupation is. She can easily picture Abby frantically trying to save all of her laboratory "babies", Gibbs running to get her, McGee hurriedly transferring all of the information they have on Dearing. She can imagine the terror on their faces as they are quite literally blown off their feet. She sees their broken, bloody bodies spread-eagled on the ground.

And again, she falls apart, collapsing on the floor in a crumpled heap. Tears course down her cheeks and heaving sobs wrack her chest. Still dizzy and disoriented, he gathers her in his arms, and his salty tears join hers. He offers no futile words of comfort. They would be empty promises, and he knows she abhors that more than most anything. They are safe, relatively so, and they have each other to hold onto. The tears that begin as a tribute to their team morph into something altogether different; the floodgates open, and it is a wave of pent up emotion from years of denial that they finally unleash.

Then, dichotomously all of a sudden and incredibly slowly, his lips are on hers. It's soft and sweet, nothing like the searching, hungry kisses they shared undercover what seems like a lifetime ago. But the feel of his lips is the same, and it overwhelms her how perfectly they seem to fit together. And his eyes are locked on hers the entire time, brimming with a perverse assemblage of bliss and sadness. She withdraws, cupping his face in her hand.

"We need to talk," she proclaims. "Is this because you, we, almost died?" The last thing she wants to do is have this conversation right now, but she refuses on principle to jump into this, feet first, without it.

"No," he states bluntly. "God, no, Ziva. How could you think that?" The look that plays across his face is almost insulted. "I'm just tired of pretending." He says with a ghost of a smile.

"So am I," she responds in kind. He opens his mouth to speak, and the first syllable almost escapes his lips when they are interrupted.

"Is anyone in there?" the voice of their savior sounds.

"Yes!" they answer in unison, his voice comparatively weak next to hers.

There is a plethora of questions that beg to be asked. Were they the only ones still inside? Were there any casualties? But as she looks to her partner for his ubiquitous support to pose the difficult questions, she is taken aback by his deteriorating appearance. His face is pale and ashen, his hands balled into fists to avoid showing the obvious pain he is in. Beads of sweat appear across his brow: when he arises, it is a tentative movement he undertakes slowly, a death grip on the railing blanching his knuckles.

The caustic sound of metal on metal rings through her ears as the rescue crew attempts to pry the doors open with a crowbar. To say Tony is unsteady on his feet is an understatement, and she deftly rises and wraps an arm around his shoulder, willing him to lean on her, in more ways than one.

"You are going to be okay," she placates him, seeing the look of fright on his face to which he will never admit. Wiping the sweat from his brow, she continues, "The bleeding has stopped. We will be out of here soon, and then Ducky can look at it."

She realizes her mistake as soon as the words leave her mouth; Ducky is at Jimmy's wedding. _At least he is safe_, she thinks. Cruelly, she decides to omit her revelation from their conversation to deduce her partner's mental state.

"Ducky's…in Florida?" he questions perplexedly, and she cannot mask her smile. He seems to be a little jumbled, but for the most part coherent. Just as her fears begin to allay, Tony lurches forward and vomits on the sterile elevator floor.

She bangs angrily on the still sealed elevator doors. "My partner has a head injury, and it is getting worse," she pleads, her voice cracking on the last syllable. "Please hurry!"

"We're doing the best we can, ma'am," they assure her. "We almost have…" The doors wrench open, and they both fall into an old habit: thank their god for getting them out of here. Unsteadily, her arm still wrapped around his shoulders, they stumble out of the elevator and catch a glimpse of the destruction around them. The roof is for the most part blown off, and she can see the twinkling stars of the night sky, their serenity taunting her.

He feels like shit. His head is spinning and he can barely see two feet in front of him so distorted is his vision. He's had enough concussions from basketball that he knows he needs medical attention. But he also knows that his injury isn't life threatening, and there're probably people who are in much worse straits than he. This whole thing feels like a weird dream to him, like he's going to wake up and Dearing would have never strapped a bomb to Vance's car. And it's not helping his massive migraine that something he thinks he said keeps taunting him at the edge of his recollection. It's probably not real, but there's a faint wisp of a memory telling him that he asked Ziva to marry him right before the bomb went off. He wants to say he can't believe he'd be that impetuous, but he'd be lying to himself. If he thought he was going to lose her, he knows he'd do or say anything.

She's staring at him with those probing, concerned eyes. "Marry me," he repeats questioningly, feeling the taste of those words, words he thought he'd never say, in his mouth.

"Yes," she answers so quietly he thinks it might just be his imagination. But her beaming smile substantiates it, and he grabs her hand in his. "I will," she finishes, patting his hand gently. He smiles incandescently, covering his entire face and lighting up his eyes, before he faints.


End file.
